


Ain't the Kind to Misbehave

by phoenike



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 1940s, Angst, F/M, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Slash, Prostitution, Unrequited Love, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-05
Updated: 2015-06-01
Packaged: 2018-02-11 21:59:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2084625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoenike/pseuds/phoenike
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Alright, fellas,” she said, and cocked a hip. “Listen up. I got a suggestion. Like I said, mister Rogers, your buddy already paid for two hours and he got a hundred minutes left. If you ain’t interested, well — thing is, I like your friend. I like him a lot. How about I do the dirty with him, and you watch?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Small deviations from MCU canon, because apparently I can't help it. OC is a one-off invented for the sake of the story. I try to stay historically accurate, but the setting is porn fantasyland, not strictly realistic. And since it's not a period I know very well, there's probably a ton of mistakes. Some stuff I've just chosen to disregard for whatever reason.
> 
> There's no direct Bucky/Steve in this, except in Steve's head. Stucky will eventually ensue, in case I end up writing more.
> 
> Beta read by Elenilote and EasternViolet, both of whom have been immensely patient and helpful. I can't thank you guys enough! Title is from a song by Peggy Lee, [_Ain't Goin' No Place_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2JzXKn9lZk).

_**New York, 1942** _

“Bucky, I’m sorry to tell you this, but this was not a good idea.”

Bucky’s face fell.

“Pardon me, Miss,” he said to the girl and steered Steve back toward the front door. When he leaned closer to whisper in Steve’s good ear, Steve could smell cheap liquor on his breath, and the tobacco he’d smoked on their stroll down from the bar.

“Steve, buddy. What’s the problem? She’s a knockout, ain’t she?”

Steve glanced across the room, fedora clutched in one hand.

The girl in question was sitting on a loveseat, sucking on a cigarette through a ten-inch holder. Bucky had introduced her as Cherry — an obvious stage name, far as Steve could tell. Rolled light brown hair, doe eyes and rosy cheeks, curvy figure wrapped in a striped red-and-white dress, like she was going dancing and the war was just a bad dream everybody shared. Steve had to admit it, Bucky knew his taste. Had she been flaunting heavy kohl, a sheer slip and a lurid smile, he would have socked his dope of a best friend in the jaw and walked out without a word.

He tried to speak calm — not an easy task with a couple too many Schlitzes sloshing in his brain. He knew now why Bucky had insisted on hitting the bars so early. “Bucky, you gotta stop trying to fix me up with dames!”

Bucky’s eyes took on a pained expression. Sweat was starting to bead on his lip in the stifling heat. Shaved smooth as a baby’s butt that morning, his jaw already sported a dark shadow.

“Come on, Steve, it’s for your birthday. I wanted to give you something special.”

“Yeah, I can see that.” Steve gritted his teeth against saying more.

His birthday wasn’t until a week away. But like everybody else that year, Bucky was going to spend his Fourth of July busting his ass hauling crates and barrels at the Red Hook, and later bussing tables and giving the ladies a spin on the floor, ten cents a dance. Steve would have done the same, but he’d lost his job at the grocer’s the week before. This time it had been his third asthma attack that did the trick. To cheer him up, Bucky had wanted to get a head start on his anniversary, and despite being slightly worried about his air of mystery, Steve had relented — a decision he now regretted.

They’d lived together for six years and known each other for twice as long. How was it possible that Bucky still thought that something like this was a good idea?

Steve took a deep breath. “Bucky, look. I appreciate the gesture, but I won’t take advantage of some poor girl who has to sell her virtue for a living.” _Also, I really want it to mean something when I finally..._ but that wasn’t something he could easily say, for several reasons.

Bucky’s eyebrows lifted. “What, you think she’s a floozie? No, buddy! I know ya.”

“You mean she’s doing this for nothing?” Steve glanced at the girl. She swung a stocking-covered leg on top of the other and smiled at him like no girl had ever smiled at him before. Blood gathered in his cheeks.

Had she volunteered to do this? Between pity and purchase, Steve wasn’t sure which motivation he least preferred. No way did a woman like her actually want him. Not ever. It was not self-pity to admit that, it was realism. If Steve Rogers could be a realist about one thing, it was where his skinny, sickly, moneyless self stood in terms of feminine interest.

“Well... not exactly,” Bucky admitted and smoothed back his brilliantined hair. “But she ain’t workin’ for a Polly’s. She’s a friend. Or, you know. A friend of a friend. Sorta.”

Steve groaned.

_Should have known._ She wasn’t a streetwalker, or a moll from any of the city’s many brothels. If Steve had to guess, she worked in one of the classier burlesque houses and entertained a few tricks on the side to get by. If the apartment was hers — or even hers and a friend’s — she wasn’t doing so bad. It wasn’t huge, but compared to the shoebox he and Bucky called home, it might as well have been the Ritz. She was probably used to a whole different kind of clientele and all of this translated to a couple hours with her being so expensive that they’d have to live on stale bread, moldy cheese and cheap coffee for weeks on end.

“Come on.” Bucky wasn’t laying off so easy. “You’ve been acting like a bear for ages, Steve. You need to take your mind off things. And I know you ain’t never... well, I got thinking that if you do it once, you’ll... you know. Get some confidence.”

Steve turned red. “Geez, Bucky. Holler it to the whole world, will ya?”

“Well, it ain’t like I didn’t already tell her.”

“Why would you...” Steve pinched the bridge of his nose. “Nevermind.”

He could almost see the whole thing, Bucky in some posh downtown club he couldn’t afford, crooning with all his considerable might in the girl’s ear about a shy friend who needed a hand. She’d probably laughed and agreed to lower her rates, just to help a poor guy out.

He glanced across the room again. The girl batted her eyelashes at him. The cigarette in her holder was getting shorter.

Who knew. Maybe she and Bucky had already...

Suddenly the place seemed several degrees warmer, never mind the temperature already climbing toward the nineties. Steve tried not to think about what Bucky might have done with her. About putting himself where Bucky had already been. But apparently he was something of an idiot himself, because the question sprung from his mouth anyway.

“Say, have you two...”

Bucky frowned. “No. Gosh. No! I wouldn’t... what d’you take me for?”

“Dumb as a post?”

“Give a guy a break, will ya? I’m tryin’ to do you a favor, here!”

Their whispers were rising in volume. Steve couldn’t help it. He’d had a bad week, he was tired of Bucky’s misguided big brother act, and besides, neither of them were exactly sober.

“Well, it ain’t the kind of favor I need! What about the rent? I just got canned, in case you forgot!”

“I got money, I can take care of the rent, Steve, but — listen, I’m gonna go now and leave you two alone, alright? Talk to her —”

“No!”

“Christ, you’re stubborn! _This_ is why you ain’t gettin’ any, Rogers. You just don’t know a good thing if it smacks ya right in the face!”

Steve wasn’t listening. A horrible thought had occurred to him. “You didn’t pay her already, did you?”

Bucky shrugged. “Well...”

“Bucky..!”

The sound of a feminine throat being cleared made them both jump.

They wheeled around, straightening, and stood shoulder to shoulder (or shoulder to ear, to be more exact). On the loveseat, Miss Cherry sat holding up her nearly finished cigarette. Her big brown eyes moved between the two men.

“You boys gonna make up your minds soon? I ain’t got all day, you know.”

Her cleavage was phenomenal. And her throaty voice was like something straight out of a Hollywood production. “Miss,” Steve stammered and fidgeted with his hat.

She inhaled from her cigarette and blew a narrow stream of smoke from between her red lips. “Something botherin’ ya, sugar?” She smiled, sweet as you please, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“No. Yes. Sorry, Miss.”

She leaned to the side and forward to stub out her cigarette. The pose drew even more attention to the deep V of her neckline. “Hot diggity,” Steve heard Bucky mutter under his breath.

“You don’t like what you see, mister Rogers?” She settled back, arms poised on the couch to display her stunning hourglass figure.

“No, Miss. I mean yes, Miss. It’s not —”

“The name’s Cherry. Cherry Fox.”

Finally Steve found enough composure to do more than stutter apologies. “You’re fine, Miss Cherry. More than fine. Beautiful. There’s nothing wrong with you. I’m afraid my friend has overreached in his... enthusiasm.”

He could almost hear Bucky roll his eyes.

“For such a tiny fella, you got awful big words in that gob of yours.” The way she said it wasn’t mean, just feisty. Steve was starting to like her — and immediately wished he hadn’t. Storming out would have seemed infinitely less rude, otherwise.

“Look, sugar,” she continued. “Here’s the deal. Your friend already paid for this afternoon. And I ain’t givin’ it back. That ain’t how it works. So you might as well try me. I’m clean, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

“Clean?” He hadn’t expected her to be dirty...

“I ain’t givin’ you no diseases, is what I’m sayin’.”

Steve opened his mouth, then reconsidered and closed it.

He hadn’t even considered the possibility of contracting something from her. She appeared so wholesome and full of life, like a pin-up girl from one of Bucky’s magazines. Steve had always assumed that prostitutes should be pitied — but Miss Cherry didn’t seem pitiful at all. If anything, he suspected that she pitied _him,_ no matter how well she hid it. It wasn’t exactly a comforting notion, or one that encouraged him to have relations with her.

She smiled, a bit softer than before. “Mister Rogers, you’re a decent guy, I can tell. I wouldn’t mind being with ya. I wouldn’t mind it at all.”

He almost believed her. “I’m sorry, Miss, but that isn't going to happen.”

“You sure? Good-looking there seems awful disappointed.”

Steve turned toward Bucky.

True enough, the sap was doing his damndest to give the impression he didn’t care, and making his usual miserable job of it. The way Bucky’s lower lip pouted gave him away, as did how his brows knitted together, like a bulldog’s. Should a bulldog ever be so ridiculously handsome, of course.

_Christ._

The goof had just wanted to do him a favor. Probably gone through an awful lot of trouble, too — to find the right girl, to set up things with her.

Steve nudged Bucky with his elbow. “Hey. Look at it this way. You got her all to yourself, now.”

“Yeah. Whatever.” He’d never thought he’d see Bucky look disgruntled at the prospect of some hanky panky with a beautiful woman.

Steve started to put his hat back on and take his leave. But before he could, he noticed an amused expression on Miss Cherry’s face. Did she think he was escaping? Hell no! He just had principles, that didn’t make him a coward. Did it? Steve hesitated.

_Dammit_. If there was something he hated, it was appearing like some lily-livered shrinking violet.

Sounds of traffic drifted in through an open window from four stories down, muted like everything seemed those days. White cotton drapes — framed by heavy blackout curtains — prevented people from across the street from spying into Miss Cherry’s apartment.

As if coming to a decision, she swung her shapely legs side by side and stood. In her pumps, she was about four inches taller than Steve.

“Alright, fellas,” she said, and cocked a hip. “Listen up. I got a suggestion. Like I said, mister Rogers, your buddy already paid for two hours and he got a hundred minutes left. If you ain’t interested, well — thing is, I like your friend. I like him a lot. How about I do the dirty with him, and you watch?”

All of a sudden, Steve couldn’t get enough air, and it had nothing to do with either his asthma or the hot and humid weather.

Beside him, Bucky stiffened. When Steve looked, he was staring forward, more lost than Steve had ever seen him.

God knew how many dames Bucky had already ‘done the dirty’ with. Something about him made girls forget what their mamas had taught them. Of course, everybody was hankering for a way to put the war out of their minds, if even for an hour or two— but it couldn’t’ve been just that. More times than one, an attempt at a double date had ended with Bucky taking home two girls, and Steve sitting on the fire escape and trying not to listen to the noises coming from inside.

“Bucky..?”

Blue-green eyes turned to him, huge and dark and guilty.

Then Bucky seemed to get a hold of himself. His devil-may-care act snapped on like armor. He tilted his head and grinned.

“Well, why the hell not?” he drawled. “I’m game.”

Steve couldn’t believe his ears. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Remember March? What you got me for a present?”

“What’s that got to do with —”

“A pair of long johns, Steve. I ain’t forgiven you for that. How ‘bout you keep ‘em, and give me this? Because it sure beats the hell out of some old pair of pantaloons.” The words were coming a little too fast, like Bucky wasn’t really thinking what he said, just babbling the first thing that came to mind.

Steve’s head spun. “You mean — you’d _like_ me to —”

“I’ve thought about it. Lettin’ a fella watch. But I want it to be you, Steve. Not some nasty ball of slime who’s gonna try to cop a feel or somethin’. It ain’t like you haven’t seen me spank the monkey before. You’ve seen it plennya times.”

Exactly how many servings of hooch had Bucky guzzled down in that gin mill? Steve had to take a moment to get over his shock.

“We were just kids,” he managed to choke out. He couldn’t believe Bucky had brought up the topic.

“So? Two boys, foolin’ around. This ain’t no different, right?”

_No different._ How could it be any more different?

The room seemed to be getting smaller, the air in it heavier — like something bad was about to happen. Steve’s mouth had become the Dust Bowl. He knew he had to say no and get the hell out of the place.

But it wasn’t just Bucky who harbored a guilty longing.

“It’s crazy,” he said and fought an urge to lick his parched lips. God, he had to be more pickled than he’d thought. How the hell else was he even considering the damn thing?

Bucky leaned closer. “Come on, man,” he whispered. “We both know you thrive on crazy. You ain’t turned your back on a dare in your life.”

It was true. Other than his womanizing and occasional drinking, Bucky had always been the responsible one. The one who tried to keep Steve from throwing his life away on some reckless whim.

And then Bucky breathed the words that were forever his undoing. “For me, Stevie?”

“Fine,” Steve heard himself say, voice rasping like a rusty hinge.

Bucky blinked and straightened, like he hadn’t really expected to hear it.

“For real?”

“That’s what I said. It’s just watching, right?” Right _._ Maybe like sighting somebody down the barrel of a gun was just looking. Bucky had to know he was full of baloney. But somehow, the idiot simply did a double take and then started beaming like the sun itself.

“Sweet!” Bucky pulled him into one of those manly, one-armed hugs that nearly squeezed out what little air he had in him. “I’m gonna owe you one, champ. A big one!”

_You have no idea._

An arm still around his narrow shoulders, Bucky started dragging him further into the room.

Miss Cherry eyed the uneven pair of them from head to toe, one perfectly penciled eyebrow higher than the other. “Aren’t you boys a little... uncomfortable? This ain’t no church, you know.”

“Yes, ma’am!” Bucky didn’t need more encouragement to shuck his jacket. His nervous enthusiasm almost gutted Steve, who followed suit, feeling more than just slightly surreal as he stripped down to his shirtsleeves — something he was not used to doing in female company, and only to some extent because there had been so little opportunity.

Miss Cherry insisted on everybody having a drink first. _To set you fellas at ease._ They settled in comfortable armchairs while she sashayed around the room. Bucky rolled up his sleeves, barely able to keep still, a big puppy waiting for a new toy that slightly scared him. Steve wiped his damp palms on his pants before he accepted a glass of scotch. He almost couldn’t hear his own ‘thank you, Miss’ from how his heart pounded.

The utter respectability of the place seemed ludicrous.

In Steve’s imagination, a demi-mondaine’s home was supposed to ooze decadence. Nude oil paintings, rococo furniture, gilded mirrors. But if Miss Cherry’s apartment oozed something, it was propriety. Everything looked clean and nice, the furnishings matched, anything old was antique, not cheap second-hand like most of what Steve and Bucky owned. A patriotic poster showed support for the troops overseas. A radio murmured somewhere. A mantel clock ticked on a bureau, surrounded by framed photographs and knickknacks. The air smelled of of heat, potpourri and mothballs. It all resembled a Sunday visit to a cousin rather than diving into a den of vice. Not that Steve had much experience of either, with his closest living kin someplace in Ireland, and all.

For once, he was glad he’d listened to Bucky’s nagging about putting on his better suit. Bucky himself of course looked smart in his starched shirt and pressed pants and spectator shoes polished within an inch of their life. For his evening job, he had to know how to dress slick without a lot of money. But Steve was aware that even in their Sunday duds, they had to be very different from Miss Cherry’s regular companions. How did they appear to her, two boys from the wrong side of the tracks? Unpolished? Vulgar? Titillating? It didn’t escape him that she could have kept the pay and not do a single thing to earn it.

The scotch was genuine. Even a second generation Paddy like Steve could tell. After a sip, he put it down on a side table. His hand was shaking too bad to hold it. Also, he’d had more than enough at the bar, and if he was going to do something this massively stupid, he needed to keep his remaining wits about him... and not dull his guilt about it with alcohol.

Bucky tossed back his drink like he was pitching for the god damn Brooklyn Dodgers.

“Right. How’re we gonna do this?”

Miss Cherry’s eyes glinted. “We could play some records? If you fellas like to dance. Might mellow you out some.”

Steve had already noticed a phonograph in the corner. He tried not to pay too much attention in its direction, because that way lay to the doorway to the bedroom, where he could see a big bed with a crochet-work coverlet on top.

The way Bucky grinned had to be illegal somewhere. “Nah. I ain’t got problems, you know. Mellowin’. Unless you want to, Steve?”

“Let’s just do this.”

“Always the man of action.”

“Up to you then, boys,” Miss Cherry said.

Bucky’s slightly sozzled gaze moved between them, as if it suddenly dawned on him that it had fallen to him to make the decisions.

_This is bad._ Still short of breath, Steve loosened his tie a notch and unbuttoned his collar. He was sweating freely from both temperature and adrenaline. For something that was supposed to be pleasant, he felt an awful lot like he was waiting for a root canal. His only comfort was that going by the stains under Bucky’s arms, he was experiencing some pressure, too.

“Right.” Bucky sprawled in his chair and patted his thigh. “Why don’t you come sit here, sweetheart?”

Steve half expected Miss Cherry to tell him to take a hike in a very hot place. But she just stood, with a little wiggle to smooth down her dress. Hips swaying, she walked to Bucky, pushed out her derriere and placed it on his thigh, hands on her knees. The way they were seated, Steve had an excellent view on them both.

“This where you wanted me, handsome?”

Bucky winked. “I ain’t him. No need to play coy, doll.”

She gave a nonchalant shrug and, pushing herself toward him like on a platter, started sliding up a hand inside his thigh.

Bucky went pink under his tan. He clapped his paw on Miss Cherry’s and stole a look at Steve.

“Okay. Maybe just a little bit coy.”

She chuckled. “You wanna take this slow for the birthday guy?”

_Please don’t. Slow is overrated. Makes you get less things done. I bet we could be out of here in five minutes —_

“Yeah.”

“You like making out?”

Bucky’s smile widened.

_Oh, boy._

Without a warning, Bucky tucked Miss Cherry to him. She yelped a small sound of fake objection, then settled sideways in his lap, an arm around his shoulders.

“Honey, this ain’t the audition for the next Tarzan picture.” She ran a hand up his arm, stopping to feel it here and there. “Though I gotta give it to ya, you got the muscles for it. Very nice.”

Bucky buried his face in her neck. He had to be in heaven, with his arms full of soft, wiggly female curves. “Gosh. You smell so good, Cherry.”

“ _You_ smell like a pig, mister,” she laughed, her hand now on his chest. And he probably did, too, despite scrubbing himself clean in the morning — but perhaps that just added to whatever backstreet fantasy she maintained of him?

“Well, I ain’t made of cotton candy and roses like the likes of you, doll.”

“You sure ain’t.” She slid a carefully manicured finger under the knot of Bucky’s tie, to loosen it some and open his collar. “All man, aren’t ya?”

“Easy enough for you to find out, sweetheart.”

Bucky’s crooning sounded effective enough to Steve, but Miss Cherry seemed entertained rather than impressed as she undid a couple buttons more beneath the loop of his tie. Steve could see the top of his singlet, and some skin, bronzed from sweating at the docks. She traced the edge of his neckline with a finger.

“Got what it takes to make good all that swagger?”

Bucky just smiled _that_ smile. The one that made girls gaze at him like the winning ticket in the Italian lottery. Miss Cherry sighed and stroked his cleft chin with her finger.

“If you ain’t the cutest thing I ever saw. The other girls went on about you the whole evening. Not sure you need to hear that, mister, but there you have it.”

“What other girls?”

“Okay, for that, I’d say you’ve earned yourself a little somethin’.”

Steve couldn’t remember when he’d started holding his breath. He only noticed that when Miss Cherry leaned to press her mouth to Bucky’s, he was feeling dizzy.

_You like making out?_ Christ. Steve knew better than anyone how much trouble James Buchanan Barnes went through so girls would like to kiss him. He brushed his teeth more regular than was normal and chewed mints to keep his breath sweet. Also, he was probably very good at it — or so it seemed from where Steve was usually standing, which was safely in the distance. He’d seen little of the heavy necking. Bucky did have _some_ manners... least when he was not sauced out of his mind.

And girls did like to kiss him. Not only was he tall and handsome and well-mannered, his smiles landed somewhere between a storm and a small hurricane on the Beaufort scale. And his mouth was as nice as any Steve had ever seen on a man. No surprise Miss Cherry seemed to have taken a liking to it.

On the silver screen, folks smooched with their heads held rigid and their lips closed. For a long time, Steve had thought that was how it was done. But Bucky and Miss Cherry appeared to have attended a different brand of theater. Their mouths worried against each other softly, and the kinds of sounds they made one sure never heard in the pictures. Bucky stroked Miss Cherry’s back slowly, encouraging her to mold herself to him. His other hand was splayed on her thigh, not doing anything yet, just resting there. The only rigid person in the room was Steve, who kept clutching the arms of his chair, knuckles white and his back straight as a ramrod.

The instinct that told him to slink away and give the two lovebirds privacy was almost overwhelming. They weren’t stopping at kissing, neither. What had Steve been thinking, signing up for this madness? No way was he gonna get through it unscathed. Better to get up and scram before he made a fool of himself.

But before he could, Bucky’s eyes cracked open and found his, so warm that it took his remaining breath away.

Just like that, Steve knew he wasn’t going anywhere.

He sat stapled in his chair. To his horror, his cock started swelling. There was nothing he could do to stop it. In what had to be less than twenty seconds, it tented his pants, and all it had taken was his best friend necking a girl and giving him a heated look. Steve tried to arrange his hands in his lap, but short of holding down his prick, there was little he could do.

“You’re a great kisser,” Miss Cherry confirmed Steve’s suspicions as she pulled away for a breather.

Bucky’s lazy grin was all over red from her lipstick. “You ain’t bad yourself, sweetheart.” His voice had a gravelly quality to it which Steve had never heard before. Somewhat like when he’d just woken up, but... different.

Miss Cherry purred a laugh and took the handkerchief from his pocket to wipe her warpaint off his mug.

Bucky leaned back in his chair. “You okay, Steve?” he asked.

“Hunky-dory,” Steve replied.

Bucky looked in his direction and blinked. “Hey, is that a woody?”

The blush on Steve felt like being electrocuted. “I ain’t made of stone, Buck.”

“Hey, hey. I don’t mind. You go ahead. Wouldn’t seem right if you sat there doin’ nothing, you know?”

“Geez..!” Steve cringed. “This is weird enough as it is!”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t mind my gab. You just... you do what you feel comfortable doin’, alright?”

Steve nodded and tried to stop squirming.

Awareness of his reaction appeared to make Bucky more confident, for some reason. “C’mere,” he said and pulled Miss Cherry back for another round.

o o o

Common sense told Steve that things were going to escalate. Somehow that failed to prepare him for the sight of Bucky frenching a pretty girl not two yards from him.

How would it feel, to be kissed like that? It occurred to Steve that it was curious he didn’t know. Back in the early years of their friendship, a much younger Bucky had sure as hell done more than ‘spank the monkey’ with him. But no kissing. That had been the unspoken rule. Only fairies kissed other men, and they weren’t fairies.

_Two boys, foolin’ around._ It happened. It wasn’t worth talking about, the kind of hooey boys got up to with each other. The first time a girl had let Bucky get past first base, he’d never touched Steve again. And Steve couldn’t blame him. What sort of man in his right mind would choose to touch a skinny thing like Steve Rogers instead of Miss Cherry, who didn’t have a bony inch in her body? Bucky had simply turned out to want what nature had intended. And Steve was trying very hard to do the same. But — well, girls weren’t too keen on dating a tiny asthmatic fella who didn’t even have a proper job. Might as well just wait. See if his luck improved once he got established. Bucky said it was a lousy excuse, but what did Bucky know? It wasn’t like _he’d_ ever needed to compensate for the lack of much.

It was a line of thought as old and well-worn as Steve’s threads, and did as little to comfort him.

He could tell that Bucky was still nervous, but that didn’t seem to bother the dolt’s enthusiasm. His hands were getting bolder on the girl’s curves by the minute, and the first time his tongue darted pink and moist between his mouth and hers, Steve was rattled to his guts. Miss Cherry yanked Bucky closer by his tie, to lock their tilted heads and open mouths together. Steve was aware she couldn’t easily have said no at this point, but something in that gesture sure made it hard to think she was just acting. If she didn’t like him, she deserved an Academy Award for her efforts.

After that, things started progressing faster. The roundabout trip Bucky’s paw had been making ended up at the front of Miss Cherry’s dress. Breathing heavy between the now wet kisses, he felt up her shape and weight in his palm, fingers rubbing her through the cloth. And Miss Cherry was giving as good as she got, with a hand that slid down his shirt and between them. Bucky shivered.

Steve snatched his scotch from the table and emptied it so fast that some of it dribbled down his chin. Damn doing this thing relatively sober.

Miss Cherry smirked against Bucky’s five-o’clock shadow. Her hand kept moving between them.

“A big boy, ain’t ya?”

“Don’t remember nobody complainin’.” Bucky’s mouth was soft and wet and his hair was starting to unravel on his forehead, giving him a rakish look, like Clark Gable in _Gone With The Wind_.

“I bet you don’t,” Miss Cherry purred.

Was she exaggerating to stroke Bucky’s ego? Steve wasn’t sure. He’d seen everything of course, even after Bucky shot up tall and filled out like nobody’s business — they were two young men sharing a tiny apartment, accidents happened. But he’d always assumed that he was on the small side and Bucky the average. Not like he had a lot of other guys to compare with.

Bucky’s eyes cut toward him. Was Steve just imagining things, or did he appear sheepish for a second? More like he was simply keeping score of how bad Steve was affected. Steve saw his adam’s apple bob.

Then Bucky turned back to Miss Cherry and grabbed her hand.

“Why don’t you get out of that pretty dress, angel?” he murmured. “Give me and my buddy more to look at.”

“Sure thing, gorgeous.” Miss Cherry removed herself from Bucky’s lap.

Steve couldn’t help glancing. There was a shape in Bucky’s pants, but it was nowhere near as obvious as his own. On account of nerves, self restraint, or just choice of clothes? Steve averted his eyes and tried to concentrate on Miss Cherry’s performance, hoping Bucky hadn’t noticed his interest.

He wasn’t entirely uneducated on the fine art of striptease. In an attempt to redirect his energy toward something that didn’t involve lying in a ditch in a pool of his own blood, Bucky had dragged him to a gentlemen’s club or four, talking his way past the doormen who always mistook him for a fourteen-year-old. Thanks to his efforts, Steve wasn’t now reduced to a completely useless, blushing excuse of a man — only somewhat blushing and slightly useless. Somehow, like all those times, he feared he was getting flustered for all the wrong reasons.

One by one, Miss Cherry teased her buttons open. After reaching the flare of her hips, she pushed the dress down from one shoulder, then the other, baring creamy skin and the straps of her brassiere. A shake of her bum sent the garment to her feet.

Bucky gave a long whistle.

The girl struck a contrapposto pose, as proud in her undergarments as Steve might have been in a dress uniform. Drawers with short legs gathered with ribbon, a lace brassiere, and a garter belt riding high on her hips, attached with four frilly garters to sheer stockings with perfect seams running down the back. All were a powdery rose color, a far cry from drab wartime unmentionables. Apparently anything was available to a resourceful enough businesswoman.

“You boys like it?”

The question had to be rhetorical, given the way Steve was gawking and how little Bucky was trying to hide his admiration.

“Worth every nickel,” Bucky said, then shook his head. “But really, Cherry. Bloomers?”

“Hey, ya told me to dress modest. For the birthday champ.”

“Well, I ain’t him. Lose ‘em. The bra, too.”

“You’re the boss.” She turned her back on them and, very slowly, started inching down her knickers.

Steve was pretty sure he ought to have paid less attention to technical detail and more to the smooth skin being revealed. But the dexterity of her fingers was nothing short of impressive. Somehow, she got rid of her panties without losing the garters and stockings. The piece of silky fabric slid down her legs, and she stepped out of it before turning back to them and unhooking her bra from the front.

For some retarded reason Steve imagined a circus drum roll when she released what was under.

“Holy cow.” Bucky looked like his face had been smashed to a wall. Minus the never-ending gush of blood, of course. (Why the hell was Steve thinking about _that_ right now?)

He tried hard to see what Bucky was seeing.

Sure, they were big. And round. Nobody with a working set of eyes could have called them anything but a pair of exceptionally well developed breasts. But Steve still failed to completely understand what the fuss was about. He liked them well enough, but they didn’t strike the sense out of him the same way that seemed to happen to Bucky.

Miss Cherry shimmied a little to make them bounce. “Happy?”

“Rapturous,” Bucky sighed.

She shrugged away her bra. “If ya ain’t careful, mister, your pal’s posh speech is gonna rub off on ya.”

“Yeah, well, he can rub on me anything he likes.”

Steve grew hot. Miss Cherry smiled and raised a brow. Bucky coughed. “I mean —”

She chuckled. “I know what you mean, gorgeous. Tight as Siamese twins, ain’t ya fellas? It’s sweet. Everybody needs someone to share their dirty secrets.”

Bucky went almost expressionless.

Then his eyes slipped toward Steve. “Yeah.” His mouth crooked in a smile. “The best guy I know. Good thing he’s a runt. I wouldn’t get a chance with you girls, otherwise.”

Steve didn’t feel very admirable, sitting there with a stiffy in his boxers while his best friend was getting it on with a beautiful dame.

“Hey, Rogers. You still with me?”

“Yeah,” Steve mumbled. “Could you two pretend that I’m not here?”

The expression on Bucky’s face made him feel like he’d kicked a puppy. Damn the guy and how he always had to wear his heart on his sleeve. “What? Why?”

“Because I’m asking.”

“Look, man, if you really don’t wanna do this —”

“No! That’s not what I’m saying. Just... do it like I wasn’t here, okay?”

The idea didn’t seem to sit so well with Bucky. “That how you want it?”

“Yeah. And you don’t need to ask how I’m doing all the time.”

Bucky looked even more uncomfortable. “I don’t want you gettin’ a stroke.”

“Bucky, I’m not gonna get a stroke because you’re petting a girl in front of me!”

“I plan to do a lot more than pet her, Steve.”

“Then get on with it, god dammit.” Steve didn’t swear often, but this seemed like the proper moment to start.

Bucky stiffened. For a second Steve was certain that he would call the whole thing off.

“Fine,” he said then and stood up. “Don’t mind if I do.”

Bucky snatched away his tie and quickly undressed out of his shirt. Stripped down to his singlet and suspenders and pants, he went to Miss Cherry and pulled her to him. In her heels, she was only a couple inches shorter than him. They would have cut a swell figure on the dance floor, dressed up to the nines, him strapping and tanned, her peaches and cream — like a postcard. But dancing wasn’t what Bucky had in mind, now. When he leaned down to take one of Miss Cherry’s plump tawny nipples in his mouth, Steve nearly scrambled up the back of his chair like a squirrel.

Definitely not something they’d put in a postcard. Least, not the kind to send home to you ma.

 


	2. Chapter 2

Aside from his antics with Bucky years ago, Steve’s sexual experience consisted of naughty comics, girlie shows and a drunken visit to a sleazy grindhouse that had left him feeling so vile that it had shriveled his libido for weeks. The scene in front of him now was easily the dirtiest thing he’d seen, and no way on Earth did it not affect him.

It didn’t strike him as too gentle, but the girl didn’t seem to mind. If anything, she appeared to encourage what Bucky was doing — by pushing toward him, by making little sounds, by her fingers curling in his hair. When the peaks of her tits had darkened and contracted to hard wet pebbles, Bucky raised his head to look. “Gosh, you’re so pretty,” he said and went in for another tongue-heavy kiss.

Dizzy with heat and muddled arousal, Steve started fanning himself with something called _Cosmopolitan_ from the table. He was beginning to feel rather uncomfortable in more ways than one. For what had to be the tenth time already, he regretted agreeing to Miss Cherry’s proposal. _How the hell am I supposed to survive this?_

At length, Miss Cherry pulled away a little. “Gotta say, if you perform in the sack like you kiss, mister, I might just haveta keep ya.”

“Can I touch ya?” Bucky’s voice was getting very husky.

The question sounded ludicrous. What else had the dope been doing for the past minute but have his dirty paws all over the girl? But Miss Cherry just chuckled.

“A proper gent, too, huh?”

Bucky blushed a little. “Pardon me if I wasn’t raised in a barn, Miss.”

 _No, although_ _the place wasn’t_ that _much better,_ Steve thought, but kept his silence. Bucky wasn’t generally too keen on revealing his background.

“Honey, you can touch me anywhere you like,” Miss Cherry said and pulled Bucky down for another kiss. Eagerly enough, the big dolt complied.

Well, at least it hadn’t taken him long to get over his little verbal scuffle with Steve.

When Bucky wetted his fingers in his mouth and snuck them between Miss Cherry’s legs, Steve reminded himself to breathe. No matter how much he wanted to escape, fainting was not an option. The girl trembled and grew sort of liquid. Soon she started rubbing her thighs together around Bucky’s hand and squirming a little.

“Oh, sugar.”

“Can I go south on ya?” Bucky almost seemed a touch hesitant now, like he was suggesting something outrageous. Not that Steve could tell for sure, since he had no idea what the words meant.

“If that’s what gets you goin’, gorgeous,” Miss Cherry cooed.

For some reason, Bucky appeared a little upset at her easy consent. He even stopped what he was doing.

“You don’t have to put on an act for me, doll. I never had a dame that got nothin’ out of it, and I ain’t plannin’ to start today.”

 _She already got something out of it, you jerk. Our next month’s rent._ But Miss Cherry just laughed. “Ain’t you a sweetheart! You can do whatever you want.”

“I want you to feel good,” Bucky said. “Is that so bad?”

Miss Cherry blinked, her mask breaking for a tiny moment.

Then she smiled, a bit rueful almost. Steve could have sworn it was the first genuine smile he’d seen from her so far.

“No, honey,” she said. “It ain’t bad at all.” And for a moment, as she stood on her toes to wrap her arms around Bucky’s neck and kiss him again, she looked like a regular girl hooking up with her guy, not a jaded cocotte.

If possible, it made Steve feel even more like a filthy peeping tom.

Still smooching, the two made their way to the loveseat. Miss Cherry settled back against the throw pillows, eyes fixed on Bucky who leaned on top of her and whispered something Steve couldn’t hear. With her settled, he started kissing a path downward, the lock of hair that had dropped across his forehead dragging over her skin.

When Miss Cherry slung one leg over Bucky’s shoulder and spread her thighs, the rest of Steve’s meager mental abilities went down in a mudslide as his mind pinpointed the exact meaning of the ominous ‘going south’ expression.

He had a general idea of the female anatomy, but reality appeared more complex than the often crudely executed ideal of dirty leaflets and ‘scientific’ publications. Between curly hair, there was something that had far too many folds and far too little of the simplicity of ‘X marks the treasure’. How was he supposed to navigate _that?_ The idea filled him with more trepidation than excitement, but Bucky didn’t seem to have similar misgivings. True to his word, he paid no attention to Steve as he went to town.

For the first minute or so, Miss Cherry seemed mostly a little surprised, mixed up with small gasps and twitches and murmurs. Steve started to fear that boasting about not getting an aneurysm might have been a touch premature.

After two minutes, Miss Cherry was moaning and squirming, and Steve tossed away the magazine he’d been fanning himself with and considered either trying to recite the Pledge of Allegiance backwards or just plain throwing himself out of the window.

“Oh, sweetie..!” The girl’s cheeks were now growing red with more than her rouge. Her carefully put together hair was starting to look a bit disheveled. It seemed that she cared less and less how she appeared and more and more how she was feeling — which seemed pretty damn fantastic. But then, Bucky had always been good with his tongue.

“There..! That — oh! — oh, sugar — oh, mister Barnes —”

“You can call me James,” Bucky said breathlessly.

“Oh, James. Please don’t stop.” She sank one hand in Bucky’s hair, obliterating the rest of what remained of his grooming.

Well, at least Steve now knew how Bucky made girls scream his name.

A couple more minutes into it, Bucky had two fingers inside Miss Cherry and Miss Cherry was arching like a bow and making high-pitched noises, and Steve could tell that if something so much as brushed against his erection, he was going to go off like the Fourth of July fireworks.

Might as well be done with it. With a hand that shook so bad he could barely control it, he pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and stuffed it down his pants.

He didn’t expect for it to last long. Usually, he was so fast on the trigger that it embarrassed him even in his solitude. And true enough, after only a few guilty pulls it started — and to his horror, Steve realized it was going to hit him hard. Too hard. He wasn’t going to be able to control himself. In panic, he clamped his teeth over his bottom lip, eyes widening.

_Bucky. Bucky. Oh God, Bucky —_

For a blessed moment, Steve floated in bliss, beyond all his aches and troubles. Then, in what could only be a few heartbeats, he crashed back — to throbbing flesh and pleasure wrecking his frail physique, to his heart skipping like a startled rabbit, to sweat sticking his clothes to his skin, to desperately trying to both draw in much-needed air and not to make a sound loud enough to be heard over the girl’s moaning.

Unbelievably, Bucky kept going at it, oblivious.

When he was able to move again, Steve pulled out the ruin of his handkerchief. The pleasant sensation of just having been punched a few times in the face was complete with the all too familiar tang of iron on his tongue. He touched his stinging mouth, but already knew what had happened. He’d bitten himself bloody, trying not to cry out Bucky’s name.

The few more minutes it took for Miss Cherry to finish were the minutes Steve needed to stop feeling like he might faint at any moment.

He couldn’t be called an expert on female pleasure, but it would have been near impossible to mistake why the girl tensed up from the couch. Compared to the amount of noise she’d made before, her climax was almost silent, mere shudders and spastic gasps for breath, her mouth a perfect O around them.

“Jesus!” she panted after melting back to lie against the couch. “I think I saw stars!”

Steve wondered if he’d ever make a woman feel that amazing. It seemed unlikely.

Bucky pivoted to sit on the floor, his back to the couch. After stealing a glance at Steve, he took his handkerchief to wipe his mug and pick something from his mouth that Steve didn’t want to think too closely about. He looked flushed and very turned on, but for some reason, not half as pleased with himself as Steve had expected.

Miss Cherry didn’t seem to notice. With a lazy grin, she started running her toes up Bucky’s thigh.

Bucky grabbed her leg. It wasn’t unfriendly, but it was clearly meant to stop her. The girl’s brown eyes turned to Steve.

 _She saw_ _me._ _She saw_ _w_ _hat happened._ In terror, Steve waited to be exposed. But instead, Miss Cherry just winked, as if they were in on a secret.

“Mind if I go freshen up, sweetie?” she asked from Bucky, and soon disappeared in the direction of the bedroom, bare backside wiggling scandalously.

With her gone from sight, Bucky stuffed his handkerchief back in his pocket. Steve tried hard not to stare, but couldn’t help noticing that his arousal was already starting to flag.

“Christ, Steve,” Bucky muttered. “Let’s go back to the bar.”

Steve’s brows climbed. Bucky wasn’t generally prone to mood swings. “I thought you wanted this?”

“So? I ain’t gonna put you through somethin’ you hate.”

“How come you decide I hate it all of a sudden?”

“I got eyes, don’t I?”

With a pang, Steve realized what (or maybe rather, the lack of what) had caused Bucky’s unexpected change of mind.

It shouldn’t have surprised him. Even back when they were kids — hell, Steve didn’t like to linger too often on those memories, but Bucky’s pleasure seemed to hinge on seeing it on others. He’d always waited for Steve to finish first, and when Steve wasn’t able, he hadn’t seemed to care too much about it, either. Was that what got girls purring for him like kittens? His need to please? Sometimes Bucky seemed to have trouble admitting that he couldn’t fix everything and charm everyone. And for all his posturing and quick fists, he was no Sam Spade or John Dillinger. Beneath the tough-guy act, he was the nicest guy Steve knew, to a fault almost. Of the two of them, Steve had always been the one to point out unpleasant truths and make the hard decisions.

Even now, he could’ve done it. Said the words and be done with it. _Yeah, you’re right. L_ _et’s g_ _et out of here_ _._ It would’ve been the smart thing to do. Not to mention, Steve’s best chance to preserve at least an ounce of his self respect.

But he wasn’t always smart. Not when Bucky was concerned.

“Bucky, you dip,” he muttered, a painful full-body blush starting from under his collar. “I just came in my shorts.”

Bucky frowned. “Huh?”

Steve held up his rumpled handkerchief, pathetic wet patch and all.

Bucky’s stunned expression was worth seeing, even if it came at the cost of Steve’s mortification. “You got your nut off already?”

“Don’t push it,” was all Steve managed to say.

Bucky scratched the back of his neck. A grin started on his face, half self-conscious, half so smug that getting slapped from here to next week wouldn’t have been undeserved. “So... you done now, or should I keep going?”

“It’s your party, Buck, I wouldn’t want you to feel left out.” Steve hoped for a lightning to strike him where he sat, because he sure as hell deserved it.

“And can I stop ignorin’ you?”

“God d— I don’t know, Bucky! This is still weird.”

Bucky’s expression turned earnest. “Don’t make me do it. I can’t. I love you, man, I need to know you’re okay.”

If the feeling in Steve’s narrow chest wasn’t his weak heart breaking in two, he had no idea what it could be.

“Geez.” He rubbed at the spot between his eyes. “Fine. You don’t have to.”

“Sweet. Listen. Relax, alright? I ain’t judging you.” Bucky didn’t sound very relaxed, himself. The opposite, in fact. Steve frowned and looked up, but not fast enough to catch Bucky’s expression before Miss Cherry’s voice interrupted them.

“Shoot, boys. Who croaked while I was gone?”

They turned to look at her.

She stood leaning against the bedroom door, a silky cream robe on her, tied with a sash at her waist. The garment wasn’t nearly opaque enough to hide much of her charms. She’d touched up her hair and makeup, with fresh red paint on her mouth, and her feet were encased in high-heeled slippers with marabou pompoms on her toes.

She looked incredible. Like something straight out of an advertisement. No wonder Bucky stared as he scrambled up to sit on the couch.

“You fellas look like you could use another drink.” She went to fetch the bottle, hips tossing like they had a life of their own. After pouring them all more scotch, she settled her swanky figure on the loveseat, one stockinged leg lifting on the other, the creamy, smooth length of it sliding in view from under the robe.

Once again, Bucky’s glass was empty in no time. After placing it on a table, he ran his fingers through his hair and shifted his weight.

“So, James,” the girl said. “What happens next?”

Steve could tell Bucky was trying not to squirm. “I’m, uh, open for suggestions?”

Miss Cherry’s voice dropped a note. “After what you did, I owe you my best performance.”

“What’d you have in mind?”

“A couple things.” She ran her eyes up and down him. “But you got too many clothes on for any of ‘em.”

Bucky was starting to blush again. “Alright,” he said and sat up to snap his suspenders from his shoulders. But before he could start opening his fly, Miss Cherry’s hand was on his wrist, stilling it.

“This ain’t the Belmont Stakes, tiger. How ‘bout you let me handle it?”

Bucky sat back and spread his hands. “All yours, honey,” he said, even as the way his eyes darted between Steve and the girl gave the lie to his bravado.

Miss Cherry stretched across the couch to kiss him.

There was no slow teasing, this time, in how she rubbed her amazing figure against him. No healthy young man could have resisted such an assault — and Bucky was certainly the healthiest young man Steve knew. In a few short moments, he was feeling up the girl’s curves through the silky fabric of her robe. In a couple others, he was sprawled on the couch with her draped on top, a deep flush rising from beneath his singlet collar as the girl’s thigh slid between his own and moved against his groin. He gave a low, muffled moan in her mouth, where his tongue was pushing slick against hers.

When she pulled up a little, he didn’t look half as cocky as before.

“Take the shirt off,” she whispered.

Bucky obeyed so eagerly that he tangled in his singlet before he managed to toss it away.

Bared to the waist, his body was its familiar self, lean and muscular from back-breaking physical labor, slightly tanned from a trip to the beach two weeks ago — different enough from Steve’s own pale, bony torso that they could have been two unrelated species. Miss Cherry sat up, straddling him.

“Not bad, sweetie,” she purred as she felt with her hands what she was seeing. “Not bad at all.”

Bucky grinned sheepishly. Steve looked at the ceiling. The last thing the dope needed was more praise.

Miss Cherry’s touches were getting bolder. She pinched one of Bucky’s nipples — and going by the way Bucky shivered, he liked it. With a mischievous grin, the girl leaned to put her mouth where her fingers had been, not unlike Bucky had done to her earlier.

When Bucky twitched and grunted, Steve blinked in surprise. He’d never bothered to think much of the pair of pimples in his own flat chest. But when Miss Cherry bit and sucked on Bucky’s and raked her nails down his sides, the big lummox squirmed in such obvious, helpless pleasure that Steve started to suspect himself of great ignorance.

In despair, he realized that he was getting hard again. Usually it took him hours to recover. For a moment, the need to escape almost overtook him. But he’d promised. He’d promised Bucky he would stay. And so he did, even as he started to slowly understand the price he’d have to pay for keeping his word.

Miss Cherry wriggled her way down until she was on her knees between Bucky’s legs. With her teeth and one hand, she picked open the buttons on his fly. Beneath it, Steve could see a pair of snug Jockey shorts stretched tight over an impressive erection. His own prick throbbed and hardened further at the sight. For a second, he considered praying — though what deity would have listened to his sorry pleading, he didn’t know.

“How about a kiss here?” the girl asked, her voice low and teasing.

Bucky swallowed, sweating in the muggy heat. His hooded eyes flickered between her and Steve. “Yeah,” he muttered.

“Then let’s get these off, tiger.”

Bucky lifted his hips, and Miss Cherry pulled his pants around his thighs. Then she hooked her fingers under the waistband of his shorts and started peeling them off, from the back at first, then the front.

Now Steve did pray, if only for a second.

Bucky’s cock was thicker than his, and curved — and different in other respects, too, courtesy of the orphanage which had taken him in at two years old and insisted on what they called a ‘scientific approach’. The barbaric operation was advertised to reduce disease and self abuse, but if it had truly diminished Bucky’s sex drive, Steve could only conclude that without it, he would have grown up completely incapable of operating like a normal human being.

“Your banana’s already peeled,” Miss Cherry contemplated, not without surprise.

Bucky was blushing hard, now. “None of my pals are cut,” he mumbled, another furtive glance thrown in Steve’s way. “It used to embarrass me.”

What pals? Did Bucky often compare dicks with his drinking buddies? Yeah, right. It was Steve he was comparing himself to — and Steve had never experienced such a choking combination of awkwardness and tenderness in his life.

“I like it,” the girl said, and slid her fingers around it. “It’s... convenient.”

Adam’s apple bobbing with a hard swallow, Bucky shuddered and stretched back against the couch.

Church-going ways and Catholic guilt notwithstanding, Steve wasn’t a complete innocent. He’d seen the leaflets circulated between male students at the art school, and heard every possible insult from street thugs twice his size. ‘Cocksucker’ and ‘ass-licker’ and ‘motherfucker’ — acts so terrible that for a long time, he’d been convinced such things only ever happened in someone’s twisted imagination. After learning otherwise, about the first one at least, he’d failed to make up his mind whether he found the idea more titillating or disgusting.

Now, as he watched Miss Cherry mouth Bucky’s balls, he understood to a painful extent how little about his friend he would ever have found disgusting.

“Careful, honey,” Bucky gasped as the girl got more playful.

Despite his surreal state of mind, Steve couldn’t help a crooked smile. Even as a boy, Bucky had been sensitive. The thought of knowing something so intimate about him alleviated a tiny part of Steve’s acute discomfort.

Obediently, the girl moved higher.

The way they were angled, the fall of her hair hid much of what happened next. But Bucky’s shifting and heavy breathing and slack-jawed pleasure were more than enough to do Steve in. And then there were the obscene sounds Miss Cherry was making as her head started moving up and down — like she was doing the sloppiest job ever sucking on a popsicle.

Steve swallowed. And swallowed again. Why the hell was he suddenly drowning on his own drool?

“Baby,” Bucky breathed out, hooded eyes fixed on what the girl was doing. And in response to his husky whisper, the tightening in Steve’s clothes turned into a full-fledged, pant-straining hard-on.

Desperate for more air, he tugged at his collar and tie, simmering in the stagnant heat and his own confusion. Did Bucky know what it did to him? Watching him with the girl? He had to... why else would he have asked Steve to do it? Why else —

No. Bucky’s sudden exhibitionism had nothing to do with what _Steve_ wanted. He just wished to know how it felt like to be watched. After, he’d brush the dust from his clothes and walk away, another notch on his belt. But Steve... what would it do to Steve?

Well, it was too late to scram, now. He’d cooked his stew and now he had to eat it. And so he watched, like he’d watched all his life, from the sidelines.

Eventually, Bucky snapped and forgot his good manners. He started tilting his hips up, driving himself in the girl’s mouth. She took it for a while and then pulled back, coughing.

“Sorry, honey,” she sputtered. “It’s big.”

Bucky’s eyes looked drugged as they turned to Steve.

The air in Steve’s lungs was like hot molasses. He pushed his hard-on against his thigh, but it was too late to hide anything.

“Wanna fuck me now, sweetie?” Miss Cherry asked.

A shiver ran down Steve’s spine.

 _You want_ _to,_ _Bucky_ _?_  Steve's heart started doing that pounding thing he’d come to associate with dizzy spells. When Bucky spoke, his voice was so husky it was little more than a whisper.

“You want me to, Stevie?”

For crying out loud, was he supposed to say something? Steve wasn’t sure anything human would come out of his mouth.

“Jesus, Bucky.” He wiped a trembling hand across his soaked brow.

Miss Cherry stood up. She untied her robe and let it fall to her feet, leaving her naked again but for her garter belt, stockings and high-heeled shoes. She turned her back to Bucky and folded from her hips. Bucky’s stunned gaze fixed between her legs.

“This where you wanna put it, James?” she asked sweetly and looked back over her shoulder.

Bucky’s eyes were blown and feverish. “I —” He swallowed.

“You wanna fuck me while your buddy watches?”

At that, Bucky’s expression turned slightly desperate.

“Yeah,” he whispered.

Miss Cherry pulled up and turned. Bucky shifted as she climbed on the couch to straddle him. As she pointed his spit-slicked cock toward her, Steve’s intellect promptly flatlined.

Bucky grabbed her by the waist. “Christ, sweetie,” he moaned as she started lowering herself. His heels dragged against the carpet. “Baby —”

He looked so beautifully ruined, for a second Steve felt batty enough to walk over and kiss him. And for another second he even allowed himself to imagine how it would feel if Bucky kissed him back. That tobacco-and-mint breath, Bucky’s warm mouth, and strong fingers caressing his neck... but that wasn’t how it would go, was it? Bucky wanted women, not a guy whose bones could poke an eye out through three layers of clothing. No matter how much that guy —

Steve went rigid.

“Oh, sugar,” the girl breathed, hilted now, hands splayed behind on Bucky’s thighs.

“Too much for ya?” Bucky stroked his fingers up and down Miss Cherry’s legs. Despite the turmoil in his mind and body, Steve couldn’t help groaning inside. _Buck, you self-satisfied ass._

“Oh, James. You feel so good.” Steve wasn’t able to see the girl’s expression, just a sliver of closed eyes and half-open mouth, and how the short, brown curls at her temples were sticking to her skin.

“Baby doll.” Bucky’s voice was now thick as melting tarmac.

“Oh..! Oh James —” The girl’s words turned into a whimper as she rolled her hips.

“Jesus,” Bucky gasped and let his head loll back again.

o o o

For such a bad liar, Steve had sure managed well when he was doing it to himself.

Over the years, he’d fallen in love with many girls. Annabel Johansen, who liked Flash Gordon and got married off to a butcher at sixteen. The Barks sisters, whose brothers had worked Steve over not once, but twice. And more recently, Maria Kowalski from the art school. Thinking of her felt like blasphemy under current circumstances.

Steve wouldn’t have minded being with Maria Kowalski. He wouldn’t have minded it at all. Miss Kowalski was candy from a paper bag and hand-holding in the park and Old Europe popish good-girl charm. She was the kind of nice that made you think about church bells and kids and growing old together. So far from scary that even Steve could almost imagine having the guts to kiss her.

But he hadn’t kissed Maria Kowalski. Not her, nor any of the other girls, those couple times he’d gotten the impression it wouldn’t have resulted in a slap in the face. He’d kept telling himself it was because of his situation. Eventually, the perfect moment would come, and everything would fall in place.

But that perfect moment had never happened. And at last he was able to admit to himself that he knew the reason.

Bucky was... he was sweat and dirt from the docks. He was Brylcreem and slick suits and swagger. He was hazy nights out and fistfights, and the hangover next morning, and the sting of iodine in Steve’s scrapes. He wasn’t perfect. He was merely what Steve desperately needed to go on living. Like the air in his lungs. Or the warmth of the sun on his face.

_This can’t be real. This can’t be happening._

But it was. It was happening, and it was just as real as the fact that Bucky was fucking a girl right in front of him.

They went on about their business, oblivious to Steve’s inner torment. Bucky didn’t have to do all that much to get ridden like a pony in a rodeo. By Miss Cherry’s enthusiasm as she moaned and grinded on top of him, she seemed to be enjoying herself. The position revealed little of what went on between them, but the sight of their mostly naked bodies and the sounds they made were mind-boggling enough — the slide of sweaty flesh and the sloppy kisses and Bucky’s hands on the girl’s buttocks and his mouth on her big, swaying breasts.

Steve no longer tried to hide what was going down in his basement. Why bother? Bucky didn’t seem to care.

“I think I’m gonna go again, James,” the girl gasped.

“A-already?” Bucky stammered.

“Said I liked ya — knew there was a reason —” She arched, her mouth open, hair falling down her back. True enough, it happened again, that shuddering and whimpering.

Bucky winced. “Christ, baby,” he hissed when she came back to earth. “Don’t move, doll. Gimme a sec —”

Miss Cherry wrapped herself around his neck and slathered him with kisses. Mumbling, Bucky held her and weathered the amorous onslaught.

“Do me from behind, James,” she panted against his mouth. “Make me scream. Christ, you drive me crazy.”

“Mmmh — geez — sure, baby, but you gotta let me set the pace. You’re hot like the sun, sugar buns, I ain’t sure I can go again in what we got left —”

“Then set the pace, tiger.” She stood up on her knees and rubbed her boobs all over Bucky’s face. He spluttered something that didn’t sound like an objection and started squirming his way out of his shoes and pants.

For the first time, Steve suspected that his presence had been completely forgotten. But when Miss Cherry got up, Bucky halted, and looked at Steve, who was wiping his face on his sleeve, his handkerchief already being spoken for.

“You alright?” Bucky asked.

Steve blinked his stinging eyes. “Ain’t had a stroke yet.” _Or just didn’t notice._

Bucky hesitated, then stood, naked as a babe. By how his eyes shifted, he did have a clue how strange the situation was, but his physique gave no signs of being discouraged.

“Breathe, alright?” He turned away, toward to girl who was now leaning over the back of the couch. “You’re doing fine, pal.”

 _Somebody just kill me already._ Steve, who felt somewhat like a wet woolen sock being roasted on a very hot griddle, winced as he poked his bitten lip with his tongue so he wouldn’t tell Bucky to go to hell. “Yeah,” he muttered instead.

For what might have been the first time in his life, Steve was happy for his lack of twenty/twenty vision. Because this time, the position revealed everything. At first, Bucky went about it slowly, like he was too aware of being on display. But soon nature took over. He shifted one hand to the girl’s neck and stood wider as if for purchase, and the next thrust shoved her against the couch hard enough to make her moan.

“That’s it, baby,” she gasped. “Harder. You know how —”

Steve wished he’d been more drunk. Perhaps then, his damned brain would have stopped going, telling him things he didn’t want to hear. Such as how he’d heard that two guys could do it like that, too. Well, not exactly the same, of course — but inside. How on earth was it physically possible to fit anything that big _there_? Steve would undoubtedly split. And it would be him doing the splitting, wouldn’t it? Even when they were kids, it had been Bucky making all the moves.

And perhaps that was the reason it had all ended the way it did? Not with a fight or a falling out. Bucky had just stopped taking the initiative, and Steve hadn’t known how to take it, instead.

He’d been fifteen for God’s sakes. Fifteen. No one should have to break their heart so young. How do you start to mourn someone who’s still right there? How do you heal? Unable to move on, Steve had invented those white lies to protect himself, about feeling drawn to Bucky because it was Bucky who had shown him sex in the first place, and how the pain he felt every day wasn’t heartache. And this was where those lies had brought him. To this room. To watching his best friend fuck a girl and knowing he would have given almost anything to be in her place.

Before long she came again, over the couch with her hand between her thighs and Bucky thrusting into her. She shuddered and wriggled and whimpered and when she was done, Bucky stilled, panting, sweat dripping from his nose.

When Steve realized that the dope had something in mind, it was already too late. Miss Cherry yelped in surprise as she was yanked up and turned. She stumbled forward on her heels, frog-marched toward Steve who started in his chair, ready to bolt. But before he could, Bucky had already shoved the girl on top of him — a panting, hot mess of slick skin and soft boobs and the smell of perfume and sweat and sex, all pushed down to Steve’s small figure. Miss Cherry grabbed the chair for support, face pressed to the side of Steve’s, heated gasps of breath on Steve’s cheek and her cloud of hair in his eyes.

_Sweet Mother of Christ._

Past the girl’s shoulder, Steve saw Bucky look down between himself and the girl with an expression of utter concentration. Then he closed his eyes and tilted his head back, and from how Miss Cherry swayed against him, Steve knew Bucky was back in.

 _Breathe_ _, Rogers._ _Breathe_ _, dammit..!_ He’d always known he’d die young, but perhaps an asthma attack while his best friend screwed a girl on top of him wasn’t the way he wanted to go.

Bucky started moving. Steve could hear every wet sound. Each thrust forced him tighter against the chair. Miss Cherry whimpered. Soon they were both gasping in rhythm, almost in each other’s mouths.

As if Bucky was fucking them both.

Steve lost it. He lost it so bad he might as well never have tried. With a sob, he pushed his hand in his pants. As he wrapped his fingers around himself, the pleasure was so intense that he squirmed.

Behind Miss Cherry, Bucky bit his lip and winced as if in pain. Every muscle in his body stood out in effort. Steve knew the exact moment Bucky’s orgasm started. He groaned, and the agony on his face shifted to something closer to surprise. He pulled out and stroked himself, and stood still on the brink of bliss. Then the first pearly rope spilled from him over Miss Cherry’s back. Some of it landed on Steve’s face and throat.

Steve’s mind turned inside out. The world went dark and glimmering.

o o o

Against expectations, Steve didn’t die that day. Before long, he even came back to the living.

“Bucky, Bucky, Bucky,” he heard himself babble under his breath, over and over, the girl’s heaving, hot, sticky weight still on top of him.

 _Jesus._ He bit his tongue and hoped he could have strangled on it.

Thank God there hadn’t been much sound. There simply wasn’t enough air in his lungs to create it. The fuzzy sensation in his head and the heaviness in his limbs were familiar from a long experience with oxygen deprivation. But his lungs weren’t burning, air flowed in and out, and even though his breath rattled a little and his heartbeat seemed less than steady, he could tell he’d live.

Eyes still closed, he yanked his hand from his shorts.

“Jesus, Steve..!” The girl’s weight disappeared from him. After a moment, strong hands shook him against the chair.

“Steve? Say something!”

“Urgh,” Steve managed.

“Look at me, pal!”

Despite not particularly wanting to, Steve cracked one eye open.

Bucky was kneeling in front of him, sweaty and completely naked. The girl was leaning over as well, a worried look on her face.

“Is your buddy alright?” she whispered.

“Steve,” Bucky groaned. “You scared the hell outta me!”

“I’m alright,” Steve wheezed and opened his other eye.

“I dunno what came over me, buddy! I was way outta line. Can you breathe? Do you need to go to the hospital?”

“Bucky, I’m fine.”

“The hell you are! You went all limp and — what the hell are you laughin’ at?”

It wasn’t funny. It wasn’t funny in the least. But for some reason Steve still shuddered with silent laughter.

“What d’you think, you schmuck?” he choked out. “I got your gunk on my face!”

Bucky’s eyes widened as he took in the truth of the words. He blushed hard on top of the blotchy redness that already graced his mug. Beside him, a smirk started on Miss Cherry’s face.

“Gave your buddy a big old pearl necklace, sweetie.”

Bucky scowled, masking embarrassment with anger. “ _He_ almost gave me a heart attack!”

 _You’re twenty-five and a goddamn machine, you can’t get_ _a heart attack_ _._ “Serves you right,” Steve gasped.

Bucky muttered something about being in the company of loonies and went to pick his Jockey shorts from the floor. As Steve mopped at his throat with his soiled handkerchief, still giggling weakly, he wondered if Bucky wasn’t right. Then again, maybe lunacy was better than the other option — namely, curling up in a ball and crying.

Turned out that Miss Cherry’s place boasted a fully equipped bathroom. At once, Steve was willing to take back all his thoughts about the place not being decadent enough for a high-class prostitute. The luxury was almost incomprehensible. Bucky took the first turn, still embarrassed enough to look relieved for a chance to disappear for a moment. With him gone, Miss Cherry pulled on her dressing gown and brought Steve some water from the fridge. Then she gathered Bucky’s clothes and went in the bathroom as well — for what, Steve tried not to think too much about, for his tolerance for the topic had been drained for about a year. He drank his water, catching at his breath and at the dregs of his reason, and was grateful for the sturdy walls and doors that allowed through little hint of what was happening in the bathroom.

True enough, when Miss Cherry and Bucky reappeared quite a while later, the girl seemed suspiciously content, and Bucky was walking a bit funny.

By the time Steve came back from his own bathroom visit, they had exactly six minutes left on the clock. Miss Cherry was giving Bucky a goodbye kiss or ten by the kitchen door, far more heartfelt than was probably appropriate for a tough-as-nails working girl.

“Come around again, baby. We can negotiate the price.”

Steve rolled his eyes. Even whores fell in love with Bucky. What chance had _he_ ever had..?

After one more moist post-coital smooch, Miss Cherry extricated herself and came over to kiss Steve on the cheek where he stood by the door, his jacket and hat laid over his arm. Despite the shower, he could still smell Bucky’s cologne lingering on her.

“I’m glad you enjoyed the show, dear,” she whispered.

Suddenly Steve remembered the way she’d been pressed against him earlier. Had she heard the name he’d chanted again and again under his breath?

Miss Cherry pulled away and pressed her hand to the side of his face. “How ‘bout you come again, too, with your friend, mister Rogers? I think you and me would both like that.”

Steve stared at the girl in horror.

_She knows._

It didn’t matter that the sentiment on her face was compassion, not mockery. Steve wasn’t ready for either. Hell, he wasn’t ready to accept his _own_ emotions, let alone have them encouraged.

“I’ll think about it, Miss,” he said and turned to go, aware that he’d rather throw himself under a trolley than come within a hundred yards of the place again.

o o o

Out on the stoop, it was almost impossible to believe that only two hours had passed.

The shadows along the avenue had hardly shifted. The sun had moved only a little on its way across the sky. It was just Steve’s heart that had been flipped inside out, so that he wouldn’t have been surprised to find himself magicked to Oz like Judy Garland.

Strutting down the stairs with his usual masculine flair, Bucky fished out a pack of cigarettes, tapped it against his hand and picked one out with his teeth. Hat set at a rakish tilt, he lit the smoke with his Zippo and offered his arm to Steve, who took it as they started down the street.

The feeling of unreality lingered. Bucky seemed less chatty than usual, too, as he set his steps to Steve’s shorter ones, even more careful than normal not to blow smoke in Steve’s direction. Everybody knew a little smoking had never done harm to nobody, but that hadn’t stopped Steve from getting the wheezes because of the fumes.

It took Bucky almost the whole cigarette to start speaking.

“We good, Steve?”

Steve adjusted his hat against the sun. Now that the alcohol had mostly cleared out of his system, he could sense a headache coming on. “We’re good,” he said.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure.”

“Did ya have fun?”

Even in the summer heat, Steve could feel his ears grow warmer. “Bucky, go jump in a lake.”

“Hey, I think I put on quite the show. Can’t fault a guy for askin’.”

“Your ego’s the size of The Queen Mary, I ain’t gonna stroke it with a ten-foot pole.”

Bucky smirked around his cigarette, then took it from his mouth and eyed Steve’s little figure all over.

“Gotta give it to ya, Rogers, I was surprised. Thought you’d become a regular boy scout, but you still know how to rope the one-eyed rattlesnake.”

“Geez..!” Seemed that, after all that had happened, Steve was still capable of blushing. He looked around, but nobody was paying them attention, aside from the usual glances thrown Bucky’s way.

Bucky kept grinning. “Under that baby face you’re still the same little terror, ain’t ya?”

“Yeah, and you’re still the biggest jerk this side of the pond.”

Bucky stuck the cigarette back in his smiling mouth and grabbed a tighter hold of Steve’s elbow. It sometimes made Steve’s life a bit difficult, how the lug insisted on always putting his arm around some part of Steve’s stunted body, but of course he wouldn’t have changed it for anything.

“So, what next?” Bucky asked. “How ‘bout something to eat? I’m starvin’.”

“You’re always starving.”

“And you don’t know what a normal appetite is. Let’s go to Tony’s.”

“That Italian pie thing again?”

“It’s called _pizza_ , and it’s the best thing in the world.” Bucky clucked his tongue. “Well, the second best. And don’t get started on dough again, Steve. I got it covered.”

Steve gave Bucky a dubious glare. “You just spent a fortune on a girl, and you ain’t worried about the rent?”

Bucky flicked the butt of his cigarette to the gutter. “Nope.”

“How come you’re so flush all of a sudden?”

“Just workin’ more shifts, is all.”

“Horsefeathers, Bucky! You ain’t got time for more shifts. You’re already neck deep in jobs.”

“Alright, alright, lay off. There’s this — dame. A real plush one. She’s got the sweets for me. A heavy tipper.”

 _Right._ Bucky _had_ started coming home suspiciously late and sober on some weekend evenings. And not so much ‘going out to think’ on the fire escape after that, either. Seemed that he had more in common with Miss Cherry than an oral fixation. Steve just hadn’t connected the dots before. Perhaps he’d been paying too little attention, the way he’d been occupied with other matters? Most of which had had a big fat ‘4F’ stamped on them.

He sensed his headache begin in earnest.

“You don’t have to do that, you know,” he said.

“Ain’t nothing wrong with takin’ a little something for what I can hardly keep from doing. And it’s just for now. Since you got the boot and all.” Bucky’s eyes grew shifty. _I promised your ma I’d take care of you,_ was the unuttered butt of his speech, but he’d stopped repeating it after Steve got so steamed up over the issue that he had an asthma attack.

“I can get a new job,” Steve said. “So many men in the service, it’s easy. In any case, you know that I’ll be going overseas soon, and then —”

“Aw, not this again?”

Bickering about the same old topic, they headed for the nearest hot dog stand.

o o o

Much later in the muggy darkness of the night, Steve woke up on the fire escape to the sound of the front door opening and closing inside.

After coming home, he’d told Bucky to take a hike so he could sleep off his headache. Obliging, Bucky had done as much, changing before he headed back out, and Steve had managed a couple hours of sweaty doze in his bunk before he got up to spoon down a cold can of baked beans and spend the last hours of the evening trying to sketch characters for a comic.

Steve could hear things happen in the kitchen with what seemed like far more effort than necessary. Eventually, bare feet approached the bedroom. For a moment, all was quiet. Then the steps came to the window.

“Steve?”

He turned to look from where he was hugging his pillow in his skivvies. Bucky’s figure loomed in the open window, barely painted out of the dark by the dim glow of streetlights from below.

Without waiting for an answer, Bucky clambered over the sill, much clumsier than normal. The old metal griddle rattled under his weight, earning him a curse from a neighboring platform.

When his friend fell on the thin mattress beside him, Steve almost choked on the eye-watering stink of alcohol.

“What the heck, Buck,” he started, but was struck silent when Bucky scooted right next to him.

“Sleep,” Bucky slurred.

 _Sheesh._ “I can’t sleep with your hot carcass so close!” For more reasons than one, but Bucky didn’t need to know that.

Bucky snuggled even closer. “Ne’er been a problem before.”

“No, but it ain’t exactly the winter now, and usually you don't stink like a —”

But Bucky’s drunken murmuring was already losing shape and his breath was growing deeper. Steve stared into the dark, half furious, half desperate.

Sleep? Yeah, right. As if he was going to catch another wink, now.

The space between the railing and the wall could barely fit them both. The temperature still lingered in the eighties and Bucky radiated heat like a stove. Based on the sounds of running water and splashing, he’d attempted a cursory sort of cleanup, but there wasn’t much he’d been able to do about the reek of alcohol.

However, none of those things were the reason why Steve started inching away.

It had to be a hundred degrees inside. Then again, he wasn’t going to be able to sleep anyway. Might as well work some more on his comic. Not that it would ever come to much, but at least it gave him something to do before —

Steve yelped as he was yanked back.

“Don’t go,” Bucky murmured against his neck. The low rumble made Steve shiver all over. He almost couldn’t believe it when one of Bucky’s legs twined its way over and between his skinny shanks.

_What the hell?_

“Bucky, you dope —” He struggled weakly, then went silent at the sensation of his friend’s strong body pressing tight against his smaller one.

_Oh, crap._

“C’mon, doll,” Bucky slurred drunkenly. “I gotta vamoose soon. Lemme hold you for a bit, alright..?”

Now too shocked to continue struggling, Steve lay still. Soon Bucky was fully asleep again, snoring softly in his hair, pressed to him from head to toe and all the far too scantily clothed parts in between. Face burning, aware that only the relative darkness protected them from anybody who happened to look, Steve yanked the sheet over the middle of his body.

Drunk enough to mistake his roommate for one of his girls, now? Christ, the goof had to be truly sozzled. Steve considered just shoving him away, but that would have risked having him wake up and notice the massive wood Steve had popped.

Steve stared into the dark and listened to the steady breath that tickled the hair at his nape.

Over the course of the evening, he’d done his best to convince himself that his revelation at Miss Cherry’s had been a fit of alcohol-induced insanity. Starved for human contact, he’d started imagining that anyone would do — even his best friend. To prove it to himself that he didn’t have invert longings, he’d tried daydreaming about Maria Kowalski.

But somehow he doubted that Miss Kowalski wore cologne or sported a five-o’clock shadow like his imagination had insisted.

Now, as his body reacted to his friend’s closeness like it had never reacted to a girl in his life, Steve’s last pathetic attempt at self-deceit finally melted away.

He was tired of lying. The more time passed, the harder it became. Perhaps some could live with such lies their whole lives — but despite his occasional hot-headedness, Steve Rogers was not a fool.

Steve shifted on the mattress. At once, Bucky tightened his hold in his sleep. His heart was beating strong and steady against Steve's back. Around them, the night was as still as it would ever get, with only the occasional catfight or hurried footfall echoing from bricks and concrete, and shirts and sheets glowing in the darkness on clotheslines above and beneath.

No, Steve was not a fool. He knew that someday soon (if the war didn’t claim him first) Bucky would get tired of slumming it out with his best pal. He’d find a girl — a buxom one, most likely, with a fire in her walk — and start producing snot-nosed little Barneses with big eyes and heartbreaker smiles. Didn’t take a genius to figure out where that would leave a no-good childhood friend. But it wasn’t like Steve would ever have to find out, was it? _I promise you, James Barnes, one day I’m gonna make you proud._ It would have to be one day soon, for obvious reasons — but still. It would happen.

And before it did... well. Would it be so bad for Steve to finally stop pretending? To himself, at least? It wasn’t like Bucky would ever need to know the truth. After all, the least Steve owed him was a decent memory. _Oh, yeah, that reminds me. Let me tell you about this crazy guy I used to_ _know_ _. Died a hero. Wasn’t afraid of nothing or nobody._ A good memory, like the ones Steve might use to comfort himself in the trenches, of a boy with unruly brown hair under a newsboy cap, smiling bright enough to light up a cloudy day as he pulled little Stevie Rogers up from the gutter, all of twelve and already full of movie-star swagger.

_You off your rocker, mouthing off at ‘em Sicilians? Gonna get yourself killed, kiddo._

Until then, Steve had this. A friend who, in his own way, loved him. And if that love came with a world of heartache... well, who ever said that life was fair?

Steve closed his eyes. And sometime before the morning, he even slept again.

 


End file.
